


hand in unlovable hand

by noahfronsenburg



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Alcohol, Banter, Canon Compliant, Cid's Emotional Issues, Domestic Fluff, Explosions As A Love Language, Inspired By A Softer World, Local Men Maybe Talk About Feelings For Like Maybe Five Seconds, M/M, Multimedia, Non-Chronological, Parent Death, Patch 4.5: A Requiem For Heroes Spoilers, Post-Coital, References to Addiction, Resolved Sexual Tension, Rivals to Friends to Lovers, Slap Slap Kiss, Trans Male Character, Vaping, Vision Impaired Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 00:55:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18216005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noahfronsenburg/pseuds/noahfronsenburg
Summary: “You know,” Jessie said, “At this rate, people, and by people I mean me, are going to start thinking youwantNero around.”(or,cid garlond's twelve-step guide to falling in love)





	hand in unlovable hand

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [cause its you (oh, it's always you)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8279258) by [noahfronsenburg](https://archiveofourown.org/users/noahfronsenburg/pseuds/noahfronsenburg). 



> big thanks to nak nak for betaing this bc i needed a hand
> 
> [10:46 PM] Fury: seeing a fic titled '["no children"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vm-NW1RwPY8)' is like looking out at a lake at night and seeing something rising from underneath it

[966.](https://i.imgur.com/D5mIA7y.png)

Cid leaned into the side of Jessie’s doorway and stood there waiting for Jessie to look up. She stared at him until it became clear he wasn’t planning to say anything, then went back to what she had been working on. It was a comfortable silence, one born from the ease of long practice.

She knew better than to start before he was ready.

“Want to go get drunk?” Jessie set down her pen and looked at Cid, who shrugged, mutely. “Can’t seem to make myself sleep.” Jessie glanced at the stack of papers she’d been working her way through, sighed.

“Me either,” she sighed. “There’s something disconcerting about seeing Nero that close to being dead.” Cid had been trying not to think about it, because every time he did—

Better not.

Jessie grabbed her vaporizer and came over to join him. “You got anything good?”

“Just whatever Rowena was willing to pass over.” Cid lifted the bottle he’d managed to cadge off of her: it was something Thavnarian, and he couldn’t read the label. She’d slid it across the desk and told him to get rid of it before she had to come up with some excuse to feed Gerolt about why he couldn’t have it. “No idea what it tastes like.”

Jessie snorted.

They took the stairs to the rooftops of Rhalgr’s Reach, and at that height the lights of the Reach below became pinpricks against the vast dark bowl of the sky above their heads. Jessie curled up near the edge, but Cid just sat down, his legs draping into space. He flicked the lid of the bottle off, and watched it soar down nearly three hundred fulms to splash into the water below.

Jessie punched him in the arm. “Don’t litter.”

“Too late,” Cid replied, staring down below at the starlight flickering off the ripples far below before taking a swig straight from the bottle. It burst onto his tongue—more floral than he expected, with a hint of orange and some pomegranate, licorice behind that and then the burn of high-proof alcohol at the end. The kind of high proof that was halfway to just drinking ethanol. He blinked when his eyes started to water, lowered the bottle, coughed. “That’s,” he tried, his tongue and the backs of his lips a little numb, “ _Much_ stronger than I was ready for.” He cleared his throat, shook his head briefly to scatter the alcohol-numb stars, took another drink, and then passed Jessie the bottle.

She did the same, coughed after she lowered it. “That started tasting like some of Wedge’s coffee and ended like whatever the fuck it is Alpha did to the thermocoil.” She stared at the label. Her eyes were watering slightly. “I _need_ to know what this is.” She took another drink, coughed, and Cid burst into laughter as she set the bottle down, pounded her chest. “ _Shit_ , we should not drink all of this. This is too good to drink all of. Also I think I might die.”

“Unfortunately, my dear, neither of us is a person of any taste at all. Bottoms up.”

 

 

They drank half the bottle or so and then gave up, because they were both old. Cid lay flat on his back, staring up at the stars, while Jessie smoked, clouds of mist billowing over them both. She had something vaguely almondy in her vaporizer, and it went well with the aftertaste of the liquor, the better-part-of-the-way-to-drunk on an empty stomach comfort. It almost felt like they were young again. He’d spent many nights like this after he had come to Eorzea, struggling to find his way out of grief and a new place in the world.

He’d spent a great deal of time half-drunk, in those early days.

“Let me have a smoke,” Cid muttered, nudging Jessie in the arm with his hand. She slapped it down.

“You’ve not smoked since you cracked your skull in half, and I’m not anywhere _near_ drunk enough to let you convince me into letting you losing the battle with addiction.” Cid groaned at her, frustrated, but not enough to do anything about it. “This shit’s terrible for you anyways, you were right to quit. At the rate I smoke, I’d be worried about you outliving me.” Jessie paused, let out a cloud of smoke as she breathed. “ _If_ you didn’t nearly die twelve times a week.”

“You never let me do anything fun.”

“Correction: I never let you do anything _stupid_.”

Cid sighed. Mostly because Jessie was right. After a long moment, she flopped down on her back next to him, leaned against his arm like a pillow. “Gods, my head’s going to hurt in the morning.” She looked over at him, snickered, then burst out laughing. “We’re too old to drink like this. You’re _forty_.”

“Must you remind me?” There was no heat in the words. Jessie laughed harder. “I am a venerable elder and you should treat me with respect. You officially stop being the Golden Boy when you outlive your father.”

Jessie abruptly stopped laughing. After a moment, she lifted her arm and let him roll over and hug her. “You are my better half,” Cid said, too drunk to stop himself. “What would I do without you.”

“Die, probably.” Jessie huffed. “If I’m your better half, what does that make Nero?” They were, after all, up here drinking partly because of him. “Are you _Nero’s_ better half?”

“Nero is an anomaly and is my own personal hell.” Cid groaned. “Please don’t make me talk about him. I’m too furious with him right now. He literally almost died in my arms and all he could do was crack jokes about it.”

“What _is_ it with you two, anyway?” Jessie shook her head, jostled Cid. “Are you two a _thing_ or—“

“Someday I will design a weapon the sole purpose of which is to erase Nero tol Scaeva from the face of the planet.” Cid paused. “Either that, or I’ll marry him." He paused. "Now I think on it, those things could happen in either order.”

“You live a difficult and complex life,” Jessie agreed.

Cid reached for the bottle, and decided he did want to finish that drink after all.

 

 

 

[948.](https://i.imgur.com/RkYY5Q4.png)

It was quiet, the kind of pre-dawn silence that fell heavy over the world like a blanket of fog, swallowed up buildings and people until everything vanished into the mists. Cid lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom in Idyllshire, taking stock of his hurts, listening to his heartbeat, and coming to terms with two facts.

First: the hurts. Back still ached a little, but an unavoidable amount. It was the remainder of throwing it out, the soreness of over-tight tendons forced to loosen against their will, the inexorable hanging realization of a rapidly approaching middle age. Also, it was just genuinely a little bruised. His ass was sore but only because he’d gotten railed. The bruising on his chest, shoulders, and hip from dodging Alexander was all still there, but it was healing. He could go ask Y’shtola for help but—it seemed a little pointless, all things considered. Some arnica would do him just as well. His heart ached, but it wasn’t a physical pain.

Second: he was alone.

 

 

Eventually, Cid couldn’t lay in bed any more. Nero had dressed silently enough to not wake him, and all his things were gone. He tried searching around to see if the other man had left anything behind. He hadn’t. At length Cid gave up, because there was no point, and he just sat on the edge of his bed, head hung between his shoulders, in only his drawers.

He’d woken up briefly when Nero had gotten up, but the other man had said he was going to take a leak. Evidently not. Or, at least if he had, he’d left immediately afterwards.

Cid dragged a hand over his face, and got properly dressed before he caught a chill. The Hinterlands weren’t in Coerthas’ icy hell, but they did have a stiff breeze, and he needed at least a shirt and trousers. He washed his face, got dressed, and very carefully boxed his feelings away until they were as small as he could make them.

He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t sad. (He was furious. He was devastated.) He didn’t care. (He cared far, far too much.) Nero could do whatever he liked. (Nero needed to come home and _stay_ , damn it.)

Cid went around afterward, asked if anybody had seen a tall Garlean in an ugly coat, carting around a travel pack. Nobody had seen him, not since Cid had removed him from an altercation with Biggs and Wedge the evening before. Nobody had seen him leave, so he’d probably snuck out before dawn. He certainly wasn’t anywhere in Idyllshire, and there was no way Cid could catch him, not with that kind of a head start. He’d never even gotten a chance to ask Nero what he was doing, where he was staying.

He’d show up again eventually if he felt inclined to.

Or he wouldn’t.

In the end, Cid had to do that which he had learned to do best from his two fathers: he bundled his feelings into a knot, tucked them deep inside his chest, barred them behind lock and key, and decided they would stay there. Until he died.

_Arsehole._

 

 

[916.](https://i.imgur.com/rAr22nV.png)

Cid prided himself on being able to solve nearly any problem; it was a hallmark of his life. He had grown up in an environment and with a father where solving puzzles was not just a way to pass the time, but the best way to _live their lives._ There was nothing more fulfilling to a Garlond than the glee of a puzzle well solved.

Which was why, after he’d almost been knocked off of the top of Baelsar’s Wall by the third rock he flung at the primal hanging caged there, he’d given it up as a moot point. There _was_ no way to solve the puzzle. The damn thing would take out anything that got anywhere near it—to even risk approach was essentially a death sentence, which rather cut the legs out of most of their options. There was no airship that could pilot the Warrior of Light near enough to deal with it, without even accounting for the fact that whatever was trapped inside the cocoon might _kill_ the Warrior of Light before any battle could even take place.

He knew when he was beat, and he was beat here. Cid didn’t have a _death wish_.

Unlike.

 _Some people_.

 _Some people_ who were currently pontificating.  _Some people_ who were standing there, smiling beatifically as the sun beat down on his face with his arms spread like he was the Twelve’s gift to Eorzea, when he, in fact, sounded like a taint would sound like if it could speak. He was wearing the same clothes he had been wearing for the past _year and a half_ and Cid was almost certain he hadn’t bathed in weeks. He smelled fine, but it was the  _principle_ of the thing. Even if Nero had bathed, it had been in body, not in soul.

Cid was so absolutely furious, so livid, (so genuinely upset and lonely, perhaps?) that he could hardly breathe. He felt like he had after he’d flung a rock at the primal cage and it had slapped him down with a streak of force so powerful it had been like getting hit in the face by a 2x4 pitched from a ceruleum-powered pitching machine. He could barely see, his vision was so red with rage. He tasted metal, or that might have been blood from biting his tongue.

Cid was going to kill him.

Cid was going to jump him and maul him to death. Cid was going to jump him and kiss him until he suffocated. Cid was going to jump him and fuck him right there and right now. Cid was going to jump him and strangle him until his face was as red as his armor. Cid was going to headbutt the underside of his jaw so hard it shattered into dust. Cid was going to _punch_ Nero in the _mouth_ with his _own mouth_ so hard he was going to _knock all of Nero’s fucking teeth out_. Cid was going to shake him and demand he explain where he kept running off to and why it was so thrice-damned important he not explain himself, _ever_.

Cid was going to fucking tie Nero up in a sack and chain him down to a post like a poorly trained wolf and make him learn to fucking _sit, stay, heel, good dog_. Cid was going to throttle him until Nero begged for him to stop and then Cid was going to throttle him some more. Cid was going to hug him, because he hadn’t heard from Nero in months and he’d vanished without any sign he was going to be coming back, and Cid could never shake the fear that, _this time_ , Nero was gone for good.

Cid was—

What came out of his mouth was this: “What do you want, Nero?”

Nero smiled back at him, that great big ugly smile of his that made him look like a horse, the one that split his face in half, that showed all his teeth in a kind of malfunctioned grimace, that was not in _any way_ attractive or handsome or reassuring. That big stupid smile that made him look even more like an unruly, gangly teenager who someone had stretched until he was the size of a house. That big stupid smile that made Cid’s heart grow three sizes.

Yugiri grabbed Cid by the back of his shirt when he took a half step forward. She could probably see the murder writ large in his eyes.

“Do not,” she said softly, “Start a brawl.” She paused, and then added: “Or, for that matter, commit public indecency.”

Cid resolved to do neither.

 _For now_.

 

 

[1001.](https://i.imgur.com/lEXIRrQ.png)

Sitting on the ground outside of the Yawn, listening to the retreating beat of the wings of the Warrior of Light’s yol, Cid leaned his full weight onto the gash currently neatly bisecting most of Nero’s throat and took a moment to compartmentalize, the way you had to when panicking. As long as he kept his hand clenched tightly around Nero’s neck, palm and thumb putting pressure on the wound that Omega had given him, Nero (probably) wouldn’t bleed out. If he kept downing the potions Cid was handing him, that would help more. Keeping his head elevated was definitely helping, too. 

That didn’t mean that Cid was _happy_ about having a valid reason to let Nero rest his head on his lap, rather than on the dirt. He _wanted_ to grind Nero’s face into the dirt. But as long as he focused on how annoying this was—keeping Nero alive—he wasn’t going to think too hard about the alternative, which was Nero tol Scaeva dying here on the ground, in his arms, malms from help, while Cid could do nothing. Just sit here, and panic, and do nothing.

Nero gave a weak cough. “Your hand,” he whispered, and Cid made a conscious decision to _not_ hear the blood gurgle in his voice, “Is making it deuced difficult to breathe.”

“The _hole_ in your _neck_ is making it deuced difficult to breathe,” Cid snapped back. “If you wanted me to throttle you, you could just have continued speaking and waited for my patience to give. You did not need to find an excuse.” Nero flashed him a half smile without opening his eyes. He was panting, and Cid adjusted his hold to put more weight onto the deepest part of the cut.

Without thinking too hard about it, he brushed back the hair that had tangled, sweat-mat, to Nero’s forehead. Tried to straighten those thick curls, just a little. “I will be the first to admit how hideous your armor is, but can you not wear it with some greater regularity?”

Nero huffed. “Ever tried to take a shit in full-plate, Garlond?”

Cid laughed. “Can’t say I have. Yet another reason to refuse to join the army.” Nero was panting into the side of his trousers. Cid could feel his blood soaking through the carbonweave, red into black. It was going to ruin Nero’s uniform, practically brand-new. Not even that particular garish red could hide this amount of blood for long. “I,” Cid murmured, lifting Nero’s head up so he could shift his leg slightly, so Nero’s weight wasn’t digging into the side of his thigh where he’d done his injection earlier that week, “Will never understand you.”

“So you have always said.”

“You hardly go to lengths to be less confusing.” Nero’s sunglasses had been snapped in whatever encounter he’d had with Omega, and without them, Cid could see his forehead creasing, his eyes sensitive to the bright Fringes sunlight even while shut. He leaned further over the other man to block it out. “One moment you threaten to bring my Ironworks down around my head, practically start another war, insult everyone I know, and the next you willingly throw your body into the line of fire to protect me. Will you _ever_ deign to make sense?” Nero didn’t respond, his breathing shallow and uneven, his pale face wan, even for him. Cid pulled out another potion, uncorked it, and held the bottle between his teeth as he fished in his pocket for a clean grease-cloth. Soaking it in the potion was difficult one-handed, but he managed well enough, and lifted his palm just long enough to shove the thing down flat onto it, coaxed Nero to drink the rest of it.

His breathing evened, his brow eased, for just a moment longer.

Cid could hear wingbeats, and prayed fervently to the Twelve who he only half-believed in that it was the rescue party.

“Simple,” Nero said, without opening his eyes. “You’re a damned easy read, Cid.” He turned his head slightly, cracked one bright blue eye to look up at Cid. His expression was hazy, his pupils blown as they always were, sensitive to light. “The moment I become predictable, you grow bored—but an enigma, that—” he coughed. “ _That_ you pay no end of attention.”

Cid sighed.

“I could still strangle you to death,” he reminded Nero. “Do not tempt me, Tribunus.”

“You called me Tribunus,” Nero smiled. It was a very distant one—he was fading, and fast. Cid needed proper help. The wingbeats were getting closer: Nero could hold on that long. The man had to be half-vilekin; this wouldn’t kill him. It had _better_ not, because _Cid_ was going to kill him. “That means you’re pleased with me.”

Cid punched him gently in the shoulder. “Take it for granted, and I’ll kill you myself and save Omega the trouble.”

Nero’s smile grew. “Love you too,” he muttered, slurred beneath his breath, and Cid ducked his head just far enough to press their foreheads together, to count Nero’s trembling heartbeats in the vein over his temple, and wondered if this was how people started to believe in gods _._

Being unable to do anything at all to help except pray would drive a man to madness.

“I’m dying,” Nero whined, making himself once again a source of unending annoyance. If Nero could bitch and moan like a child with a bad headcold, he was doing just fine. “I am going to die. It’s not even a romantic death.” Hard to be more romantic than dying with your head in the lap of your childhood friend-cum-lover-cum-rival, but sure, Nero. Whatever floated your airship.

Cid sighed, smiled. Banged their foreheads together hard enough that Nero whimpered an _ow._ “Shut up.”

 

 

[854.](https://i.imgur.com/4jH6Zno.png)

“Do you remember when we almost got caught stealing all those pylons?”

“Mmm?”

“The pylons, in our third year. And we stole half a dozen to make that big singing coil?”

“Now you mention it, I do remember. And they had to call your father in?”

“And he wasn’t available so Gaius showed up—“

“And hired us to make three on the spot instead of disciplining either of us?”

“I always forget about that part. The Tutor was so furious, he looked like he was about to have an attack of apoplexy.”

“I’ve always wondered if that stroke he had two years later was our faults.”

“Probably.”

 

 

“Are you asleep?”

“I _was_.”

“I...I’ve missed this.”

“Shut up, Garlond.”

 

 

[1037.](https://i.imgur.com/ojkuTyI.png)

Cid woke early, against his will, because Nero had rolled over his back and was digging the top of one sharp hipbone into the Cid’s lower back. It was hot and uncomfortable in his too-small bed in Mor Dhona, Nero burning off heat and calories even in his sleep, a blanket someone had stuffed full of twigs. But the even breathing in Cid’s ear—the gentle, little half-snores, a whistling on every in-breath—meant that he was willing to suffer a great deal of indignity for five more minutes of peace and quiet. It was rare that spending time with Nero meant anything other than trying to one-up one another into a colossal meltdown, and rarer still that Cid got to just _enjoy_ his presence, without it being frustrating or sex-related. Contrary to popular (i.e., his own) belief, Cid did, genuinely,  _like_ the man.

So he closed his eyes, and dozed back off for a time, content to lay supine. Considered, in his half-awake fugue state, the merits of buying a bigger mattress. It would reduce the amount of livable space in his rooms, but it could potentially coerce Nero to stick around. That would, however, require Cid not cover the bed in random junk, and he’d not succeeded at doing that so far in his life ever, and he didn’t have high hopes for the future, either. But it might be nice. Just a little more room, maybe some bedposts, with loops on them, to tie Nero down to.

Not in a sexual way, but in a _stop running off and trying to get yourself/me/the entire world killed to prove some kind of a point_ way.

“You are thinking so _very_ loudly,” Nero muttered into the back of Cid’s neck, just barely loud enough that Cid could hear, more of a rumble that vibrated into his body than words. The hot puff of his breath against the nape of Cid’s neck was almost enough to tickle. “What on Hydaelyn could be of such great import this early?”

“Wondering if I had a bed that properly fit your legs if you’d stay.”

Nero made a thoughtful noise, nuzzled closer, and wrapped both his arms all the way underneath Cid’s chest to hold onto him like a favorite soft animal. He yawned. “Perhaps,” and then lapsed into quiet snoring again moments later. It was only with some great difficulty that Cid managed to extricate himself from the newly developed torture device putting all of his weight onto Nero’s elbow where it dug into his bladder, and he rolled over to sit up, the other man curling into the warm spot he left behind, face soft with sleep.

Cid had heard of people who looked innocent or beautiful when they slept. Nero looked neither. He just looked red-faced and blotchy, his hollow eyelids swollen and his mouth slack. He drooled when he slept—he’d left a terrible big splotch on Cid’s shoulderblade—and Cid paused, noticing for the first time streaks of grey in Nero’s hair, a few strands coming in at his temple, just above his ear. Without thinking, he reached for it, brushed it between his fingers.

Nero murmured unhappily at this disruption, but didn’t attempt to stop him. “You have some grey here,” Cid said, thumb stroking along the fine seams of the bones of Nero’s skull, the shallow dent of his temple. He always forgot they were both far nearer to forty now than thirty. “You are _not_ mature enough for that.”

“All the stress of putting up with you,” Nero muttered, and Cid smiled, glad Nero couldn’t see it. “Can’t possibly imagine what yours would look like if I wasn’t around.”

“Arsehole,” It came out far more fondly than Cid had intended it. He tried—and failed—not to feel Something when Nero caught his wrist and pulled his hand over, brushed a soft kiss to the back of his knuckles and then between his fingers, pressed the warm side of his cheek into the back of Cid’s hand.

He had heard a saying before that if you loved something, you must let it go. And as much as he was still (too-tired to be actively livid about it) furious as to Omega and Shinryu both vanishing, and how much of that was Nero’s fault ( _all of it_ , in Cid’s book), he knew he couldn’t keep Nero here. He would go away again, just as he always did, an unstoppable force careening wildly through life upon Hydaelyn without ever having installed brakes.

The second half of the saying was, after all, if the thing you loved came back, then you did not have to fear.

Despite everything, Nero always came back. Iron to a lodestone. A gravitational pull. Inexorable, indefatigable, unavoidable, unstoppable. Where Cid was, Nero would then be.

Cid pinched Nero’s nose shut, and Nero snuffled awake, already squawking and put-out, slapping at Cid’s hand where he was holding Nero’s nostrils. “Stop it,” he whined, nasal and unattractive as-per-usual, and Cid caught the hand that slapped at his wrist, pulled it to his face. He glared at Nero, and let the other man feel his expression, not opening his eyes. Not that he could see it clearly _anyway_.

“What crawled up your arse and died?” Nero said, after a moment, pulling his hand back. Cid leaned over him on the bedsheets, folded his hands atop Nero’s chest and stared down the bridge of his nose at him.

“If you,” Cid began, “Run away and do _not_ help me clean up the mess that _we_ made with Omega— _you as much as me, Nero_ —I will find some torture to inflict upon you that will make death seem a better alternative. Possibly lock you in a totally empty room devoid of all life except for Wedge, while you are strapped down to a table, and have to build every single one of his increasingly bizarre design ideas for attempting to win the heart of his definitely-not-interested paramour.” Nero made a face at him; Cid sighed. “I know you’ll leave the instant I turn my back on you for longer than five minutes, so I shan’t pretend you won’t. But I _will_ expect that you will help solve this, one way or another, at _some point_ in the not so distant future. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal,” Nero wheezed, slightly breathless from Cid’s weight on his chest. He’d been flattening Cid all night; all was fair in love and war. “Duly noted. I will keep it in the forefront of my mind.”

Cid kissed him again. “I am going to go take a leak and get something to eat. If you’re still here when I get back, I’ll suck you off before you go.”

Nero whined into his mouth before he pulled away, and Cid left him sprawled in the bedsheets, secure in the knowledge that at least if Nero was going to run off and fuck around in the wilderness for a while, eat vilekin and leaves or whatever, sooner or later, Cid was going to put a leash on him. Then, _t_ _ogether_ , they were going to figure out what the _fuck_ Omega had done. For better or worse.

 

 

[1147.](https://i.imgur.com/XqDxksR.png)

There was this Look Nero got on his face when he was Up To Something, and it would have been hells more helpful to know that if Nero wasn’t always _Up To Something_. It was hard for Cid to know if Nero had ulterior motives in resurrecting Omega aside from sheer, bullheaded curiosity and a desire to, apparently, watch the damn world burn; _or_ , if Nero’s ugly face just looked like that.

Nero was wearing that expression the moment he slapped his hand to the transporter tomelith and disappeared into the bowels of Omega. For a moment, Cid considered letting him run wild without adult supervision. It could not make their predicament any worse, could it? A handful of minutes of Nero going wild in the bowels of Omega weapon?

“Godsdammit,” he snarled, “I can’t let Nero tinker around in there by himself.”

Inside, Nero was not tinkering around: he was standing at the control panel, waiting for Cid. “Is all going well out there?” Nero asked, distracted. He’d already practically forgotten that they had left their escort, no doubt.

“I have little worry that the Warrior of Light can handle this themselves, if that’s what you’re asking.” Cid frowned as he dragged the schematics window over, started to page through Omega’s visual specs, glancing for current output—everything was at stasis levels, but he found himself not particularly reassured. He trusted nothing where Nero was involved. “You’d be no help; last I remember they thrashed you so hard that you had to go hide your face for three months.”

“Yes, well.” Nero huffed a sigh. “We could feasibly drag this out all night, but that cocoon shan’t hold forever. So if your vaunted hero is going to—” Nero made a complicated, wordless gesture that Cid interpreted as something verging between _thrash people_ ****and _make a nuisance of themselves_ , “I wish they would do it sooner rather than later.”

When their silence had grown thin, Nero’s braggadocio with the Red Baron gone stale, Cid stopped staring at readouts and data streams. Instead, he stared at Nero, his pale face washed out even more by the old-style hard light of Omega’s control bank desaturating the entire room. “Have you thought of what will happen if this fails,” he asked, voice quiet.

Nero paused, for just long enough that Cid could read _hesitation_.

“In what way? Because yes, I had considered that Omega may not be capable of dealing with whatever it is Ilberd summoned. If the prayers of Eorzea were enough for Master Louisoix to nearly summon the Twelve, the creature brought forth by the deaths of Ala Mhigo may be nigh impossible to contend with.” Nero rubbed his chin and fished in his pocket for a sheet of paper covered in his illegible scrawl, red ink bleeding all over the parchment. “But should it fail, we shall have tried. At least we can count ourselves lucky in delayingthe inevitable.”

“No.”

Nero looked up.  _Finally_.

“Have you considered what should happen if you are wrong about Omega. About what might happen if this—” Cid’s throat closed up, and Nero’s wide blue eyes stared back at him, unreadable.

Nero studied Cid for a long moment in silence, and then huffed a laugh, shook his head. “Then,” Nero said at last, his face that manic rictus grin of the unstoppable force to Cid’s immovable object, “ _Aut simul stābitis aut simul cadētis_.”

Nero ran his hand down the top row of switches, turning them all upward, the entire control bank fully lighting up as he disengaged the stasis and powered the entire launch sequence on. Around them, the room began to hum with life. Cid sputtered. “That is _not_ how that saying goes!”

“Is it?” Nero grinnedat him. “We came into this unforgiving world together, Garlond. I for one intend we go out the same way. Temporal stasis is disengaged, all systems operational.”

Cid found himself, unexpectedly, grinning back. He felt _hope_ , the way he had when they had been children. Hope, and aninexplicable, horrible fondness for the man who had once been the boy who chased him frantically hither and yon, both a shadow and an unreachable goal, a promise of what the future could be, if they just _reached for it_.

“Garlond?” Nero asked, and Cid could hear all that desperate, foolish affection, decades of promise and failure and sheer, bullheaded hope for a world they could better, even if it killed the both of them in doing it.

And yet here they were. _Either we will stand together, or we will likewise fall_.

If Omega killed them, Cid could rest assured that he would not be suffering endlesstorment alone. Hell would be eternity of Nero tol Scaeva, but at least Nero would be just as miserable as Cid was. The bastard.

“All clear on this side! It’s waking up.”

 

 

[990.](https://i.imgur.com/tdm3K29.png)

Cid stopped prepping for the Carteneau flight and set down his wrench, looking up at Alphinaud, who was leaning against the side of the _Excelsior_. He’d been sitting there since Cid had come out, and said nothing. Just looked thoughtful.

“If you don’t mind my asking, what is the story with you and Nero? You went to school together, if I’m remembering correctly? And he was involved in your experiences with the Crystal Tower. I certainly am not trying to pry, but you seem to have a good deal of bad blood with him.” Cid glared hard enough Alphinaud held his hands up, placating. “I am merely asking. In our current situation, you two need to work together.”

“You’re prying. I’m not talking about it.”

“Opening yourself to being willing to talk about your emotions can help you heal from trauma,” Alphinaud replied, and Cid groaned.

“Aren’t you a kid? Can I tell you to shut up?”

“I’m _twenty_ , Cid.”

“You were cuter at sixteen.” Cid could practically hear Alphinaud roll his eyes. “It’s complicated, and I do not want to deal with it, and getting into it is terrible. Suffice to say, one of these days Nero will be found dead somewhere and I’ll be arrested and the trial won’t be rigged because I _will_  be guilty. He is my own personal curse.”

A glance up at Alphinaud showed the young man was staring back at him, eyebrows practically in his hairline.

“So, are you fucking, or not? Would it help you two sort this Omega mess out better if you fucked first?”

“Who taught you that language,” Cid sputtered. “Since when are you legally allowed to say fuck. Are you legally allowed to say fuck? Do I have to report this to Alisaie?”

Alphinaud groaned aloud. “You are being ridiculous. Cid, my point is this: either kill Nero or do not, I certainly would not blame you for doing it, but do it _after_ you two activate the Omega weapon, if you would be so kind. At least be cooperative for, say, an _afternoon,_ if you can manage it? I would appreciate it, as Eorzea hangs in the balance.”

“Mouthy brat,” Cid mumbled. Alphinaud patted him on the shoulder. “It’s complicated, and I’m not sure where it stands, but the minute I figure it out I will be certain to share with the class. I can suffer him long enough to see Omega working but I make _no_ promises for afterwards.”

“I am immensely proud of you,” Alphinaud told him, almost proudly.

Almost.

 

 

[1073.](https://i.imgur.com/tzJQEIY.png)

The Fringes were _hot_. The Fringes were _dry_. The Fringes were full of weird, violent plant life with a knackering for flesh, the remnants of the XIIth legion, more aether than Cid had ever wanted to breathe in his entire life, a massive fuckoff big hole that was more than a fulm wide and so deep he’d not bothered trying to calculate it, enough problems to give him fifteen migraines over again, and lots and _lots_ of dirt.

The Fringes were _very much_ not full of Nero tol Scaeva, international headache, personal burden to bear, and most annoying spoken on the face of the planet.

Cid celebrated his fortieth birthday stomping back and forth from Castrum Oriens to the Yawn four different times, wiping the sweat off his brow as the sun beat down and wishing for a proper mount. Cid celebrated _Nero’s_ fortieth birthday half-delirious in Rhalgr’s Reach with a fever he’d gotten from some kind of horrible desert vilekin.

Cid spent the rest of his time tracking trajectories for Omega from its last known location over Castrum Oriens to its final resting place in the Yawn. If he got particularly fed-up and wanted to be furious with something new (i.e., not Nero, not Omega, not Nero again but for slightly different reasons this time, not Ilberd, and not Nero for a completely different unrelated problem, one which was four letters long and started with _l_ ) he tried to figure out what had happened to Shinryu. That last problem at least got solved without his having to do it: it was almost reassuring to know that the Warrior of Light had disposed of a solid 30% of their missing-in-action pains-in-the-arse by putting their foot firmly in the center of Zenos’ chest and kicking until The Entire Shinryu had popped back out of him.

The other 70%, as far as Cid was concerned, was 40% Nero and 30% Omega. He’d much rather have the former back than know how to tie a rope to the latter and drag it into the prime material plane.

“Stop being so damn out of sorts,” Jessie chided him, two days after Ala Mhigo had been liberated, when she found Cid still working at half three bells. “You should be happy! Not often we strike such a blow to the Empire. You of all people ought to be at least  _grateful_.”

“Very grateful,” Cid didn’t look up from the scribble he was scrawling at the corner of a page of equations. “Very angry.”

“You know,” Jessie said in such a tone of voice that Cid  _i mmediately_ looked up, glancing to her face. He did not like the implications of that particular tone of voice on her, which read as _I am this close to pulling that chair out from under you_ and/or  _staging a divine intervention_ _._ He found her jaw set as hard as mythrite, her arms crossed and her gaze piercing, “At this rate, people, and by people I mean me, are going to start thinking you _want_ Nero around.”

“Get bent,” Cid shot back without heat, standing for the principle of the thing. “It’d be like wanting another hole in my arse: I’ve got one, and another wouldn’t even be good enough for shit.”

Jessie replied: “Hmm.”

Cid didn’t like _hmm_ s. Especially not from Jessie Jaye.

“Please, gods, no,” Cid pressed his forehead to his equations, even though he knew it meant grease from his pencil would wipe off on his skin. “Do not, please do not, I beg of you, goddess of my life, fire of my soul, uncompromising conqueror, terror of all clerical work, demon bastard who haunts my nightmares, _please_ do not do whatever it is you are thinking. Please do not do it. I will do whatever horrible headache-inducing menial task you foist on me and I shall not complain about it at _all_ if you just _please_ do not enact bloody-minded revenge on me. I do not want to consider the potential ramifications if you and Nero teamed up. I am a good man, Jessie. I am a good man, and I have never done anything wrong, please do not torture me.”

“I’ll consider it,” Jessie told him in such a way that what she really meant was, probably, _tough luck._

 

 

[1055.](https://i.imgur.com/tNRAFer.png)

In-between the moments of chaos and fear, when the Warrior of Light pressed on into the next round of combat, facing down the newest bedtime-tale storybook come to life, the silence left behind in their makeshift command chamber was oppressive. Not because Cid couldn’t stand Nero; no.

No, it was because Cid found himself almost instantly in the mindset of himself twenty years before, in another lifetime. The years spent in school, side-by-side through everything from terrorist attacks to grieving for parents, Cid and Nero had honed a relationship as true as that of any lovers in Nero’s stupid lullabies. It was hard to avoid facing down the realization of their busted love story when it was hanging between them and they kept passing each other a pen or a wrench and it would perk up hopefully, as if to say, _what happened_?

Mid had died and taken Cid’s innocence with him. Garlemald had grown as stale as the dank air in an unopened tomb. Dalamud had fallen and taken Cid’s belief with it.

But the World of Darkness had happened, and given him back some hope. And so had their waking Omega. Nero passing Cid a cup of coffee whenever his mug ran low had happened; Nero had shown up in Idyllshire to check on him and help Cid fix his back. Nero had followed him across two continents and literally through death Nero had abandoned their homeland and his family and his entire potential future for Cid.

Not that simply, but it had still been because of Cid. It was only now that Cid was beginning to realize that their entire lives had revolved around one another. That Nero had defined himself as _Cid’s opposite_ , for good or ill.

And still, half the time Cid would sit there and fling insults rather than relate, because it was just—easier. It was just easier to lash out and be cruel, when Nero would take it and nobody else would. Because Nero had seen the worst of him, and still looked at Cid like the sun shone out his arse. But the wistful longing when Nero talked about his childhood stories, even if it went side-by-side with Nero bragging about how good he had been at childhood stories (that wasn’t even a thing you could _win_ at), reminded Cid of when _they_ had been young. How Nero was trying to help, even if he was awful at it.

The world hadn’t ended. The world might still end. If they fucked up, the world would _definitely_ end, because the Warrior of Light would get erased from existence by some idiot’s idea of a good bedtime story.

Nero’s footsteps came over, and Cid looked up as the other man rejoined him, fixing his sunglasses as he tapped grimly on one of the older display screens. The Warrior of Light had told Omega where to stuff it with regard to being able to fight multiple world-ending abominations in a single go, and had run off somewhere to rest—leaving the two of them in charge of preparing for the next part of the Deltascape. “I think,” Nero said, thoughtfully, “I may have some idea what this third story may be referring to. I’m not certain, but...”

Cid watched Nero, as he kept talking, and found himself wondering how, lately, every time the world almost ended, Cid ended up standing next to Nero, and every time he was a little bit happier about it.

“Shut up,” he said, not unkindly, and Nero grinned at him.

“Just because _one_ of us owned an annotated copy of  _Horridumm’s Fairy Tales_ and it wasn’t you does not mean you need to be _sour_ about it. Why, you were quite enamored with it during our time in school. If I remember correctly, you had a great deal of affection for the God of Thunder, Cidolfus—“

Cid elbowed Nero. “Shut up.”

“Cidolfus Garlond—“

“ _Ugh_ ,” Cid replied, voice dripping with disgust, because the worst thing about realizing he was maybe sort of falling in love with his childhood friend-cum-lover-cum-rival was that Nero knew all his awful dirty secrets and embarrassing stories, because Nero had been his roommate for five years and had seen him go through puberty twice. “Remind me to feed you to whatever Omega coughs up next. It’d be nice to have some peace and quiet for a while.”

“You only wish, Garlond.”

 

 

[588.](https://i.imgur.com/PmLQhPH.png)

In their post-orgasmic haze, sprawled together in bed, Nero reached out and took Cid’s hand, laced their fingers together. He said nothing for a time, just lay there and breathed while Cid read through a stack of blueprints he’d needed to sort through for weeks but had been left to the side, decaying, untouched, in light of the once-again-probable end of the world. Now that Omega was tomorrow’s problem, focusing was easier. It certainly helped, too, that he’d made Nero get on the floor and beg.

“You’re unusually quiet,” Cid said, eventually, setting aside another blueprint that he needed to never see mentioned or considered as viable ever again. “Can I count myself lucky enough to have an entire evening of peaceful silence?”

“Had you wanted to shut me up, Garlond, you could have simply choked me.”

“I did,” Cid replied, and Nero giggled quietly, because he had. “If you want me to keep it up, you need only ask.”

“I believe I have quite had enough for one evening.” There was a rustle and the weight next to Cid on the bed rolled closer. Nero leeching his body heat, no doubt. He was always freezing cold. “What are those.”

“Ironworks projects,” Cid turned the page on one, rotated it and tilted his head sideways to see it from a different angle. “Or attempts at them. I have been reticent with my approvals, in light of recent disasters. Not that there’s much here to approve, mind you. The concepts are often far more developed than the actual designs.”

“Want me to take a look?” Nero budged closer, and Cid passed him one of the sheets. Nero planted his elbow on the bed and leaned over Cid to the side-table, dug around in the drawer to find the penlight Cid kept in there, and flopped back to lay supine next to him. With the penlight on, Nero tilted the blueprints back to get better contrast and held them an inch above his face, squinting intently at them, making the light shine through the lines of the paper. He studied the plan, and Cid studied _him_ , watching as Nero muttered to himself, his mouth a moue of displeasure as he got more and more invested into the blueprint, before he practically tossed it onto Cid’s face.

“If I have to spend one more moment looking at that, I shall have to get up and bleach what remains of my vision out of my eyeballs. What on Hydaelyn is that.”

Cid turned it over, peeled it off his face, and searched for a title. “Early rough design for self-winding curtain pulls. Potentially very useful as an assistive device, but being able to ramp up to speeds of nearly thirty yalms a second is _absolutely_ unnecessary. That engine needs to be downgraded to a clockwork crank.”

“It will take someone’s eye out. Swap the strings for a chain and have it be contained within the panelling for the window so that it can be operated from outside.”

“Oh, good idea.” Cid scribbled that addition down, and only noticed halfway through, so focused on adjusting some of the system requirements, that Nero had curled closer, hooked their ankles together, tucked his chin onto Cid's shoulder.

“You’re deflecting,” Nero said quietly, his palm hot on the base of Cid’s stomach, blunt nails scraping through his pubic hair. “You have not mentioned Omega once since we returned.”

“I spent most of that time fucking you,” Cid pointed out, tossing the blueprint into the pile for Morning Cid to sort. “It is rather hard to discuss the moral imperatives of potential doomsday technology released into the Eorzean wild, along with an uncontrollable dragon, while in the midst of focusing on what best angle to sit on your face at.” He could practically hear Nero roll his eyes.

“Stress-fucking does not un-make the problem causing the stress.”

Cid debated pulling his pillow off the bed and shoving it partway into Nero’s mouth. Instead, he turned to look at the other man, drowsing and handsome with a fresh-fucked post-coitus glow, and glared. He glared because he _did not like it_ when Nero was either a) sensible or b) right, both of which he was currently being.

“I am just saying,” he continued. “For a man committed to only using great power responsibly, your utterly blasé reaction to the afternoon is unusual, to say the least.” Nero raised his eyebrows. “Do you wish to share with the class, Garlond? Or shall I expect your full breakdown when the potential ramifications hit you?”

“You’ll be long gone, I’m sure,” Cid rolled away, got another blueprint out. “Why show remorse now, when it was your damn idea to begin with? Curiosity for curiosity’s sake finally beginning to feel not-so-validating?”

“It constantly astounds me that you still haven’t realized that, had I truly wanted to, I could have woken Omega at any time on my own.”

Cid froze.

“I discovered the stasis system over a year ago, and started to study it soon afterward. The rest of the time between then and now I spent triangulating the location of Omega beneath Carteneau, projecting the potential damage outputs should my understanding of the stasis system fail to be adequate, and translating all of the remaining documentation I could access. It was relatively simple, all things considered. Once I had the aether signature from the World of Darkness via the energy that had been previously refined by Syrcus Tower, it was only a matter of reversing the polarity, so to speak, and tracing the terminus to its source. Had I wanted to assuage my damnable curiosity, I could have done so the morning I first found the control system, after I spent two hours slapping my hand to random tomeliths.”

Cid stared at Nero. He was on his back again, staring at the ceiling, his sharp face in stark profile in the low light from Cid’s bedside lamp, his blond hair spilling in unkempt curls across his face. Nero looked at him, arched one eyebrow, face a perfect portrait of sarcasm (condensed). “Had you not realized I had that sort of capability at my disposal, and yet I did not? I certainly considered the possibility, but quickly discarded it, as the rousing proved no point and solved no problems. I may not _agree_ that all science must be good science, but I _can_ agree that I much prefer it when you are pleased with me, rather than furious. You are far more likable when you enjoy having me around.”

Cid stared at him, utterly speechless. “You...” he trailed off. “You waited for over a year to activate Omega...so it would be  _useful_. You sat on it, even with everything prepared to go, so that you could  _help_?” He paused. “So you could help _me?_ ”

Nero snorted. “Contrary to popular belief, Garlond, I do genuinely enjoy the opportunity to assist, and I _am_ on your side, even if you insist on setting yourself diametrically to me. I’ve no more future awaiting me in the homeland than you do. I am afraid Eorzea is quite stuck with me, just as I am with it.”

Cid could not find the words to respond, could not find it in him to speak.

So he took Nero’s face in his hands—

And kissed him.

 

 

 

 

 

[1113.](https://i.imgur.com/DU2pjGZ.png)

Cid _was not_ lonely. He wasn’t. 

He woke up every morning and went around the Reach and found that everything was less colorful than it had been. The monotonous daily grind was somehow even less rewarding, but at least it was something to do. Balancing invoices and sorting through engineering drafts and checking other people’s maths and writing interminable numbers of letters and signing stacks of paperwork from sunup to sundown meant he was, if not entertained, at least not left to his own devices.

He did not miss Omega, the stress of waking up every morning, terrified someone he loved would be dying.

He missed—

 

 

A fortnight after Nero and Alpha had left, Cid sat at breakfast with Biggs and Wedge and picked at a bowl of porridge that he did not want to eat. It had blueberries in it. He loved blueberries.

“You love blueberries,” Biggs pointed out. Wedge took another frycake off his plate, rolled it into a tube, and shoved it whole into his mouth before gently flattening it until it vanished completely into his cheeks like he was some kind of strange, hibernating mammal. “You always eat your blueberries.”

Cid stared at them.

Cid sighed.

“I,” he said, with the finality of a man who is accepting the inevitable of a bridge falling on top of him after he has tried vainly for decades to convince the Eorzean Corps of Engineers to finally please put some money into updating the river supports, “Am in love with Nero tol Scaeva.”

Neither of the other two said anything. Just chewed.

“Coulda told you that like, fifteen years ago.” Wedge’s voice was muffled by his mouth still being full of bread. “Please tell me you aren’t just realizing it.”

Cid shut his eyes and made a face like he’d just eaten a lemon. “Shut up,” he said, as unkindly as possible. “In my defense: he is stupid, his haircut is terrible, and every time he opens his mouth I want to punch him _in_ the mouth _with_ my mouth.”

“Close enough,” Biggs agreed at last. “Better late than never, Chief. You got there in the end.”

Wedge patted him gently on the back. “Eat a blueberry, Chief.”

Cid ate a blueberry. “Nero finds shiny things and brings them home to show me because when I get bored I’m sad, and he wants me to be happy. He just has not yet managed to figure out that shiny things do not necessarily have to be apocalyptically powerful ancient technology that could potentially backfire and kill all of us. I am interested in other things.” He could not think of other things he was interested in. There were other things. He really enjoyed fixing all the stuff Nero broke. Usually apocalyptically powerful ancient technology that could potentially backfire and kill all of them. “Like sudoku.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” Biggs shook his head. “One day, it might just stick.”

Cid sighed, put his chin on his palm, and looked off hopefully into the distance. He had heard something once, a saying about being _a matched pair_. Like peas in a pod. Grapes in a bunch. Alternating currents.

So, maybe he was in love with Nero.

There were worse things to be.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [beautiful, once](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18658513) by [noahfronsenburg](https://archiveofourown.org/users/noahfronsenburg/pseuds/noahfronsenburg)




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